


Children Will Listen

by gutsandglitter



Category: The Worst Witch (TV 2017)
Genre: Ada and Hecate are super married and this is the hill that I have chosen to die on, F/F, cw: vague-ish implied homophobia, your friendly neighborhood witchy gay aunts are here to comfort all the baby gays
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-28
Updated: 2017-10-28
Packaged: 2019-01-25 09:38:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12528404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gutsandglitter/pseuds/gutsandglitter
Summary: Mildred took a deep breath. “...is it true that you two are married? To each other?”A simple question dredges up some complicated issues for Ada and Hecate.





	Children Will Listen

**Author's Note:**

> I had originally intended for this to be a kind of silly "Ada and Hecate being cool gay aunts" fic, but then it turned into...this. Set during Mildred's fourth year at Cackles.

It was an all-too familiar tableau - Miss Cackle, seated at her desk with her fingers steepled under her chin, a furious Miss Hardbroom looming over her left shoulder, and Mildred Hubble and Ethel Hallow sitting before them, heads bowed in shame. Mildred was taller, and Ethel had gotten her braces removed, but little else had changed over the course of the past four years.

Miss Cackle sighed. “I suppose I have no choice but to place you both in detention,” she said. “A week should suffice, as no one was injured. But you girls should consider yourselves lucky, manticores are generally not as amiable as this one was.”

Mildred seemed relieved by the relatively mild punishment. Ethel looked as if she had just swallowed a toad.

Miss Cackle waved her hand in a shoo-ing motion. “Now off with you both, I believe you're late for chanting class.”

Ethel stalked out of the room, muttering under her breath. 

Mildred, however, remained seated. Her shoulders were hunched, and she wore an uncharacteristically morose expression.

“Miss Hubble? Was there something you needed?”

Mildred looked down at her bootlaces (which were, of course, untied).

“There was, erm, something I had been meaning to ask you, both of you, I suppose.”

“Go ahead then.” Miss Cackle smiled encouragingly, while Miss Hardbroom arched an eyebrow.

Still unable to look either of her teachers in the eye, Mildred started to mumble. “Well I...some of the older girls were talking, and I know I had heard someone say something about it before, but it’s probably just gossip someone made up because they were bored or beca-”

Miss Hardbroom let out an irritated huff. “Sometime this century, Miss Hubble.” 

Mildred took a deep breath. “...is it true that you two are married? To each other?”

Miss Hardbroom’s eyebrows flew towards her hairline as her face grew more pale than usual. She spluttered, seemed to start six different sentences at once (the only word Mildred could make out was “insolent”), then pursed her lips into a flat, fuchsia line. Her right hand, which had been resting on the back of Miss Cackle’s chair, was now locked in a white-knuckled grip. 

Miss Cackle, on the other hand, looked like she was fighting back the urge to laugh. She reached over her shoulder and patted her Deputy’s hand before adjusting her spectacles and leaning forward. 

“Might I ask what prompted this inquiry?”

Mildred suddenly became very interested with a loose thread on the hem of her dress. “I um, I was just wondering if witches...if that was something that the witching community was accepting of?”

The silence stretched out for an indeterminable amount of time, punctuated only by the light ticking of an unseen clock. Mildred began to shrink back in her chair, instantly regretting having asked the question. 

“I see.”

Miss Cackle glanced up at Miss Hardbroom, whose expression softened to something just short of tender. Her grip on the chair back became a touch more relaxed, and for a moment she seemed slightly less formidable.

Miss Cackle turned back to Mildred with a gentle smile on her face. “Yes dear, Miss Hardbroom and I have been married for some time now. And the witching community is quite accepting of same-sex relationships, if that’s what you’re asking. Here and there you’ll find a stodgy old wizard who disagrees, but they are and have always been in the minority.”

“Really?” Mildred asked, eyes wide.

The headmistress nodded.

Miss Hardbroom began to tap her fingertips against her ever-present pendant watch. “When one belongs to a group that has been persecuted throughout history, it tends to make them more sympathetic to those who have been similarly persecuted,” she added. 

Mildred’s eyes lit up, and Miss Cackle felt a pang of sympathy. She couldn’t help but wonder how long the girl had been worrying about this.

She started to ask, then thought better of it. Best to try a more roundabout approach. 

“Is there any particular reason why this has been on your mind?”

Mildred’s cheeks pinked, and for a moment the headmistress thought she might bolt from the room. Instead, she looked back down and resumed playing with the loose thread. “It’s just that I, well I really never thought much about boys before, and mum always said I was just a late bloomer which seemed like it could be true. But lately I’ve started to wonder if maybe…maybe that’s not really the case.”

Miss Cackle and Miss Hardbroom shared a knowing look. Mildred had recently befriended Jadu Wali, the new transfer student. The fact that Mildred seemed enchanted by the other girl (and followed her around much in the same way a young Miss Hardbroom had once followed Pippa Pentangle) had not gone unnoticed by the two older witches. 

Mildred twisted the thread around her finger. “I already have a hard enough time fitting in with the other girls, I don’t really need another reason for them to think of me as a freak.”

Miss Cackle folded her hands together on top of the desk blotter. “You’re not a freak, dear, for this or any other reason. And whatever the case may be, just know that Cackle’s Academy will always welcome you with open arms.”

“Unless you fail your exams next week,” Miss Hardbroom added dryly, though there was no real bite to her words.

A sheepish smile spread across Mildred’s face. “I suppose that’s fair.”

The tension she had been carrying in her shoulders seemed to have dissipated some, and Miss Cackle’s heart ached. This girl, who had already faced a level of adversity which might have made a grown woman crumble, had thought she might be rejected from the witching world for something she had no control over, something that should have been beautiful and exciting and stressful in an entirely different way. 

The headmistress cleared her throat, pushing aside a rising tide of sentimentality. There wasn’t much she could do in this situation; she could only hope that the girl had taken her words to heart.

“Well if there’s nothing else, I think you should be getting to your next class.”

Mildred nodded, shouldering her book bag. “Thank you Miss Cackle, Miss Hardbroom,” she said, nodding to each witch in turn before bounding out the door and down the stairs.

The walls seemed to let out a silent sigh as she left, marking the absence of the frenetic energy that filled the air every time Mildred Hubble entered a room. Miss Bat had once referred to it as “aftershocks of the chaos that trails in her wake,” but only Mr. Rowan Webb had been listening to her at the time. 

After a few quiet moments Ada shook her head and smiled. With the flick of a finger she conjured a pot of tea, wrapped a crocheted cosy adorned with tiny pink rosebuds. Steam wafted from the spout, filling the air with the sweet scent of chamomile and lavender. She glanced up at her Deputy, who looked like she was about to be sick.

“It was never exactly a secret, you know,” Ada said, trying to keep her tone light. 

“Yes, but I hardly see what business it is of theirs,” Hecate grumbled. “Is it so unreasonable to not want my love life to become fodder for schoolgirl gossip?”

Ada rolled her eyes. “They’re teenagers, Hecate. Even the ones who don’t know have probably speculated at some point. It’s just what they do.”

“That may be, but there’s no reason to encourage it. The only two people who need to know about our marriage are right here in this room,” said Hecate, in a tone bordering on petulant.

It had been fifteen years since they had exchanged their vows in front of the Great Wizard, and in all that time Ada had never once felt any sort of particular need to force the issue. For as progressive as the witching community could be in some areas, they still preferred their children to be taught by spinstery old witches straight out of the fairytales, so being less than open about their marital status had always made sense on a professional level. And besides the two of them, anyone who really needed to know already did - Dimity, Miss Bat, Alma, Hecate’s sister, a few close friends who taught at other schools. But seeing the normally effervescent Mildred so worried and drawn had caused a small measure of guilt to bubble up within Ada’s core. 

“Don’t you think we owe it to the girls?” she asked softly, giving voice to her own concerns. “How many more of them are like Mildred Hubble, out there wondering if they’re all alone or if they could ever have the kind of future they find themselves dreaming of?”

Hecate began drumming her nails against her watch again. “I thought you would know better by now than to bring up Mildred Hubble when you're trying to convince me of something,” she muttered.

Ada smiled and stood, wincing as her knees creaked. She took one of Hecate's restless hands in her own and laced their fingers together.

“Fine, then don't think of Mildred. Think of yourself when you were her age. If you had been able to see two witches you admired in a happy, loving relationship, don’t you think it might have made a difference?”

Hecate pursed her lips and looked away. Ada knew her question had hit home, possibly harder than she had intended it to.

Hecate’s father had been one of the stodgy old wizards who were in the minority. Though he had never been violent or outright cruel to his daughter, his cold, quiet disapproval had seeped into the very marrow of her bones and festered there for decades. Time might heal all wounds, but it often leaves more than a little scar tissue behind.

Ada unlaced their joined fingers and opened her arms. After a moment’s hesitation, Hecate turned into her embrace, wrapping her arms around Ada and pressing a cheek against her silver hair. They stood like this for a solid minute, holding each other close and taking comfort in the familiarity of the gesture. Despite their significant height difference, their bodies had always seemed to fit together just right. 

When Hecate had first kissed her all those years ago, in a chilly corridor lit by a small dancing torch flame, Ada couldn’t help but notice how different it was from the first kisses of her youth, with the dramatic fireworks and near-violent lust. Kissing Hecate filled Ada with a gentle warmth which spread from her core to the tips of her fingers and toes, like coming in from the cold to find a crackling fire nestled in the hearth. It was grounding, an overwhelming feeling of safety and security like nothing Ada had ever experienced before. Hecate, quite simply, felt like home. 

Eventually, Hecate let out a soft sigh. She turned her head and pressed a kiss just above Ada’s left ear. “Alright then. If you think it’s for the best.”

Ada pulled back just enough to be able to cup Hecate’s cheek in her palm. It didn't seem quite right to thank her, so she instead stood up on her tiptoes and gave her a gentle kiss. She started to lower her heels but Hecate followed her, stealing a second kiss, and then a third. The corners of her mouth had ticked upwards slightly, and color had begun to rise in her cheeks.

“So are you saying I’m right?” Ada murmured against Hecate’s mouth, unable to resist the urge to tease. “Because I’d quite like to get that in writing.”

Hecate huffed a laugh, dropping her forehead to rest against Ada’s.

“Just know that you will be fielding any and all questions that might arise once the rest of the students find out.” She was smiling in earnest now, the signature half-smile that lit up her face better than a toothy grin could light up any other. “I may be married to a woman, but that doesn’t mean I want every student with a crush on her classmate to come running to me for advice.”

“I think you’re safe there, love,” Ada said, laughing. “But yes, I will play guidance counsellor if need be.”

Hecate stole another kiss. “I have to go prepare for my next class,” she said, tucking a stray lock of hair behind Ada’s ear. “But perhaps I could stop by your rooms tonight after rounds?”

“I’d like that.” Ada straightened Hecate’s collar and stepped back, giving her room to transfer. 

The brunette lifted her left hand and paused, staring at it for a moment before casting a silent, unfamiliar spell. Ada felt a small tickle and looked down just in time to see her wedding ring materialize on her own left hand. 

Since their wedding day, the simple rose gold band had spent nine months out of the year nestled in a velvet box on her nightstand. Through an unspoken agreement, it had only seen the light of day during the summer months when the couple had the castle to themselves, away from prying eyes and unnecessary questions. This had never particularly bothered Ada, but the sweetness of this gesture made her breath catch in her throat.

Hecate ducked her head, embarrassed by her own sentimentality. 

The last thing Ada saw before she disappeared was the silver filigree band on her wife’s left hand, catching and reflecting the light of a late afternoon sunbeam.


End file.
